Father's Day Murder
by Leslie Meier
Series: Lucy Stone #10
Series Rating:
Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation on January 1, 2003
Genres: Cozy Holiday Mystery
Pages: 256
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Also in this series: Trick Or Treat Murder, Wicked Witch Murder , Valentine Murder
When her part-time reporting gig gives Lucy the opportunity to attend a Boston newspaper conference, she looks forward to the vacation from domestic bliss. But upon leaving Tinker’s Cove, she quickly discovers that alone time can be kind of…lonely. And in between libel workshops and panel discussions, Lucy takes a guilt trip. She feels terrible that she won’t be home to help her husband celebrate Father’s Day.
But when Luther Read—head of a nearly bankrupt newspaper dynasty—suddenly drops dead, Lucy has other things to think about. Murder, for instance. She’s not buying the theory that Luther died of an asthma attack. The man just had too many enemies. Always the intrepid snoop, Lucy vows to investigate. But she can’t help wondering if her name will end up on a byline—or in an obit…
The Newspaperman of the Year is dead. Why would someone kill him?
Father’s Day Murder by Leslie Meier is following Lucy Stone as she is in Boston for her newspaper and how the main attraction is murdered. Lucy is trying so hard to balance her work life and her personal life still, which doesn’t seem to be working.
The sleuth, Lucy Stone
Lucy Stone is the main character and the one that we follow around even though it’s in the third person. She is an investigative journalist and a mom that is trying to do a lot of good. Lucy is a great reporter with a good head on her shoulders, who is trying to get her job done and keep her house sane. She makes some good acquaintances at the convention and is trying to hone her craft with their workshops. It seemed to be okay until the award ceremony. Let’s say Lucy is on the case even though she shouldn’t be.
There is a lot of things that I like about Lucy. Including the whole thing about going after this story to uncover who the real murderer is. Even if it leads her and some other reporters down a dark hole, Lucy is great at meeting people and getting them to open up. The one thing that I disliked is that she didn’t trust Bill (her husband) to take care of the kids.
The Mystery
This mystery is different and so mysterious. Luther Read Sr was the president of a newspaper chain that has a bunch of other smaller newspapers as well. He was also going to be the newspaperman of the year. Everyone at the convention knew that he had asthma and that he could be triggered by anything.
Figuring out who killed him was so hard. Not only for me to figure out but because we didn’t know what killed him until later in the book. He was poisoned, which was so odd since no one else was. Luther Sr had a bunch of people upset with him. Having to narrow down the suspects is worse. Almost everyone that Lucy uncovered had a good motive for it. I didn’t guess who did it at the end, but after the motivation was brought up, it made sense.
5 Stars for Father’s Day Murder by Leslie Meier
My rating for Father’s Day Murder by Leslie Meier is five stars. Everything about this book was excellent, and I loved it. The new setting, the mystery, Lucy learning about the way everyone else works for the different newspapers, and that she can trust Bill to watch the kids.
I highly recommend this book to all Cozy readers.
Thank you for dropping by! I hope you enjoyed this review of Father’s Day Murder by Leslie Meier.
Until the next time,
Happy Reading!
About Leslie Meier
I started writing in the late ‘80s when I was attending graduate classes at Bridgewater State College. I wanted to become certified to teach high school English and one of the required courses was Writing and the Teaching of Writing. My professor suggested that one of the papers I wrote for that course was good enough to be published and I sent it off to Ellery Queen’s Mystery Magazine’s Department of First Stories. I got $100 for the story and I’ve been writing ever since. The teaching, however, didn’t work out.
My books draw heavily on my experience as a mother of three and my work as a reporter for various weekly newspapers on Cape Cod. My heroine, Lucy Stone, is a reporter in the fictional town of Tinker’s Cove, Maine, where she lives in an old farmhouse (quite similar to mine on Cape Cod!) with her restoration carpenter husband Bill and four children. As the series has progressed the kids have grown older, roughly paralleling my own family. We seem to have reached a point beyond which Lucy cannot age–my editor seems to want her to remain forty-something forever, though I have to admit I personally am dying to write “Menopause is Murder!”
I usually write one Lucy Stone mystery every year and as you can tell, my editor likes me to feature the holidays in my books. Of course Christmas is one of my favorite times of the year and my newest mystery “Eggnog Murder,” is included in an anthology with two other Christmas novellas by Barbara Ross and Lee Hollis. I’ve long been a fan of the classic English country house mystery, and was a faithful watcher of “Downton Abbey,” so I couldn’t resist trying to write one. I think I succeeded rather well, if I do say so myself, with “British Manor Murder,” which came out in October, 2016.
My books are classified as “cozies” but a good friend insists they are really “comedies of manners” and I do enjoy expressing my view of contemporary American life.
Now that the kids are grown — we have five fabulous grandchildren — my husband and I are enjoying dividing our time between Braintree and Cape Cod, along with our cat, Sylvester.
The above and picture were taken from the author’s website.
Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
- 2019 Cloak and Dagger
- 2019 Craving For Cozies Reading Challenge
- 2019 Cruisin' Thru The Cozies Reading Challenge
- 2019 Goodreads Reading Challenge
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